I have two models
class Information < ActiveRecord::Base
belongs_to :study
validates_presence_of :email
end
and
class Study < ActiveRecord::Base
has_many :informations
accepts_nested_attributes_for :informations
end
I show up a form of study which contains few fields for the informations and i want to validate presence of those fields. Only on validation success i wanted to save the study field values as well and i wanted to show errors if the validation fails. How can i do this? Thanks in advance.
You write validations in the models that you require, as normal. So if you need to validate presence of field foo in the Information class you'd just write validates_presence_of :foo in that class. Likewise validations for Study fields just go in the Study class. With nested attributes, when you update a Study instance from a params hash that contains nested attributes, it'll update the Information instance(s) too, running validations in passing. That's what the accepts_nested_attributes_for call is doing - it's giving "permission" for the appropriate bits of a params hash to be used in this way.
You can use reject_if to only reject new nested records should they fail to meet criteria. So I might let someone create a Study and only create one or more nested Information instances associated with that Study if they'd filled in field(s) in the form, but if they left them blank, the nested stuff wouldn't be created and saved (so you don't get pointless blank associated records). The Study would still be saved. For example:
accepts_nested_attributes_for(
:informations,
reject_if: proc() { | attrs | attrs[ 'title' ] .blank? }
)
This and more is covered in the API documentation here:
http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveRecord/NestedAttributes/ClassMethods.html
Beware that nested fields are intended for existing records only. If you were creating a new Study instance in a new/create action with no Information instances associated, you won't see any nested form fields for your Information class at all - when you might be expecting just one, for a blank new item. This can be very confusing if you aren't ready for it! You'll need to manually add a new Information instance to your Study instance in the controller or similar for the 'new' and 'create' actions, e.g. using before_filter :create_blank_object, only: [ :new, :create ], with, say:
def create_blank_object
#study = Study.new
#study.informations << Information.new
end
you can use validates_presence validation available in rails other wise you can write before_create or before_save callback method. write validation logic inside the before_create or before_save callback method.
Check out the API Doc for validates_associated:
Validates whether the associated object or objects are all valid. Works with any kind of association.
If you call a method on the parent object which runs validations (e.g. save), the validation on the associated objects will be called as well.
Related
I currently have a form for a nested resource in one of my activeadmin pages:
f.inputs "Courses" do
f.has_many :registrations, :allow_destroy => true, new_record: true do |tc|
tc.input :course
tc.input :semester
end
end
This is for a student resource. A student has many course_offerings through registrations. However, I didn't want users to select the course_offering directly from a menu (Since there will be many repeats of the same course each year). Instead there is an input for course and semester. course and semester are instance variables on the registration model. They are set in the form, then the correct course_offering is found in an after save hook and associated with the registration. The code is as follows:
def semester=(s)
#semester = s.to_i
end
def semester
self.course_offering.semester
end
def course=(co)
#course = co.to_i
end
def course
self.course_offering.course
end
before_save :set_course_offering
def set_course_offering
self.course_offering = CourseOffering.where(semester_id: #semester, course_id: #course).first
#TODO: Handle case where no course offering is found
end
I am having two problems. The first is that I get a nil pointer error when registrations table is empty.
undefined method `course' for nil:NilClass
I have accepts_nested_attributes call in my student model.
accepts_nested_attributes_for :registrations, :allow_destroy => true
which is the only suggestion I get when looking up the error but still get it despite having that piece of code. It seems to work fine when I remove the course and semester and replace it with a course_offering instead.
The next problem I have is that the student record does not save after hitting update. I assume this is because I don't make any changes that write to the database when I only update the two course and semester instance variables only. I either need to update another input or add the call to the semester= method.
You get an undefined method error because when the registration table is empty there are no course offerings associated with your student, so in the accessor method for course you get nil for self.course_offerings. You could try this instead which takes the nil value into account:
def course
self.course_offering.try(:course)
end
You don't need the accept_nested_attributes_for because you don't want to create or modify course offerings through students.
For your second problem: you're right about the dirty tracking. Your model is not saved because your student model has not been modified from the perspective of ActiveRecord. You need to flag an attribute (eg course_offering) as dirty by hand with the course_attribute_will_change! method before saving the model.
Although this situation looks like a good example to introduce form objects. There is a great library for that called reform.
I have a model:
class A < ActiveRecord::Base
has_many :B
end
And I want to reset or update A's B association, but only save it later:
a = A.find(...)
# a.bs == [B<...>, B<...>]
a.bs = []
#or
a.bs = [B.new, B.new]
# do some validation stuff on `a` and `a.bs`
So there might be some case where I will call a.save later or maybe not. In the case I don't call a.save I would like that a.bs stay to its original value, but as soon as I call a.bs = [], the old associations is destroyed and now A.find(...).bs == []. Is there any simple way to set a record association without persisting it in the database right away? I looked at Rails source and didn't find anything that could help me there.
Thanks!
Edit:
I should add that this is for an existing application and there are some architecture constraint that doesn't allow us to use the the regular ActiveRecord updating and validation tools. The way it works we have a set of Updater class that take params and assign the checkout object the value from params. There are then a set of Validater class that validate the checkout object for each given params. Fianlly, if everything is good, we save the model.
In this case, I'm looking to update the association in an Updater, validate them in the Validator and finally, persist it if everything check out.
In summary, this would look like:
def update
apply_updaters(object, params)
# do some stuff with the updated object
if(validate(object))
object.save(validate: false)
end
Since there are a lot of stuff going on between appy_updaters and object.save, Transaction are not really an option. This is why I'm really looking to update the association without persisting right away, just like we would do with any other attribute.
So far, the closest solution I've got to is rewriting the association cache (target). This look something like:
# In the updater
A.bs.target.clear
params[:bs].each{|b| A.bs.build(b)}
# A.bs now contains the parameters object without doing any update in the database
When come the time to save, we need to persist cache:
new_object = A.bs.target
A.bs(true).replace(new_object)
This work, but this feel kind of hack-ish and can easily break or have some undesired side-effect. An alternative I'm thinking about is to add a method A#new_bs= that cache the assigned object and A#bs that return the cached object if available.
Good question.
I can advice to use attributes assignment instead of collection manipulation. All validations will be performed as regular - after save or another 'persistent' method. You can write your own method (in model or in separated validator) which will validate collection.
You can delete and add elements to collection through attributes - deletion is performed by additional attribute _destroy which may be 'true' or 'false' (http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveRecord/NestedAttributes/ClassMethods.html), addition - through setting up parent model to accept attributes.
As example set up model A:
class A < ActiveRecord::Base
has_many :b
accepts_nested_attributes_for :b, :allow_destroy => true
validates_associated :b # to validate each element
validate :b_is_correct # to validate whole collection
def b_is_correct
self.bs.each { |b| ... } # validate collection
end
end
In controller use plain attributes for model updating (e.g update!(a_aparams)). These methods will behave like flat attribute updating. And don't forget to permit attributes for nested collection.
class AController < ApplicationController
def update
#a = A.find(...)
#a.update(a_attributes) # triggers validation, if error occurs - no changes will be persisted and a.errors will be populated
end
def a_attributes
params.require(:a).permit([:attr_of_a, :b_attributes => [:attr_of_b, :_destroy]])
end
end
On form we used gem nested_form (https://github.com/ryanb/nested_form), I recommend it. But on server side this approach uses attribute _destroy as mentioned before.
I finally found out about the mark_for_destruction method. My final solution therefor look like:
a.bs.each(&:mark_for_destruction)
params[:bs].each{|b| a.bs.build(b)}
And then I can filter out the marked_for_destruction? entry in the following processing and validation.
Thanks #AlkH that made me look into how accepts_nested_attributes_for was working and handling delayed destruction of association.
In general, I have a website which needs to have complex registration process. And in that registration process I need to include 4 tables from database.
Now... I cannot validate one by one model and to enter 4 of them in database. Is there a way to make common points of all those tables in one model?
Let's say:
User model has columns: username, name, etc.
Package model has: type, account_number
etc
And in registration process I need to include username, name, account_number and to validate them. How to do that?
Without seeing your model structure, this is just speculation, but here goes:
--
Virtual Attributes
In your User model, you can use attr_accessor to create a set of virtual attributes - which basically mean you can create a series of setter / getter methods in your User model.
Although I don't think this will help you directly, it should give you an idea as to how you can create single-model validation:
#app/models/user.rb
Class User < ActiveRecord::Base
attr_accessor :new, :values, :to, :validate
validates, :new, :values, :to, :validate, presence: true
end
This will allow you to create the attributes in the User model - and although they won't be saved, you can then use them to validate against
attr_accessor
To give you a quick overview of this method, you first need to remember that Rails is just a collection of modules and classes.
This means that every model you load is just a class which has been populated with a series of getter / setter methods. These methods are defined by ActiveRecord from your data table columns, and are why you can call #user.attribute
The magic is that if you use attr_accessor, you'll basically create your own attributes in your User model - which won't be saved in the database, but will be treated like the other attributes your objects have, allowing you to validate them
Because your registration process seems to be complex, I would go even futher as virtual attributes and use Form Objects
7 Patterns to Refactor Fat ActiveRecord Models
LA Ruby Conference 2013 Refactoring Fat Models
ActiveModel Form Objects
I understand that you multistep registration. You shouldn't create 4 models only because your view pages needs it. You should:
remove validation from User model and add validation on each form
create 4 different forms (for example extends by ActiveModel or user gem reform)
add validation to each form
after form.valid? save part of user info to #user object
Thats all.
Rails noob ,
I am trying to write a custom validation but I am dependent on parameters that come from the post request. This example is similar to what I have - in this post model I want to validate that a user didn't already post on some topic, but to do that I have to have the topic id from the post request:
class Post < ActiveRecord::Base
...
validate :user_already_posted, on: :create
def user_already_posted
topic=Topic.where(id: params[:topicId]).first
//some code that runs on topic users and makes sure the user hasn't posted there
However , I learned that params isn't global and models can't access it (I last used laravel where this isn't the case , so it's confusing for me).
Are custom validations not suited for what I need ? do I need to look at filters or have the controller run a validating function of it's own?
You could do this:
validates_uniqueness_of :user, scope: :topic_id
May not be exactly what you need, but the point is that you can validate within a scope.
You can also pass an array to validate on multiple parameters.
validates_uniqueness_of :user, scope: [:topic_id, :post_id]
I think you are having a bit of a design problem here. You are creating a post validator, but the validation itself is not about the post instance. I mean, the model validator must evaluate all of the post attributes, using the default validators built-in ActiveRecord or creating custom ones, like you did, acessing the attributes via self.
I believe a class method receiving all your parameters and checking the conditions of the post creation is more clear:
Class method on the model
def self.user_already_posted(topic_id, user_id)
# Do your thing
end
Usage on the controller
can_create = Post.user_already_posted(params[:topic_id], params[:user_id)
I have two models that are associated with each other in a has_one and belongs_to relatiionship. When I POST a new :foo object (using the "create" method in the :foo controller), I would like to also be able to do an operation using the associated attributes of the :bar model and then return the the user the results of a particular operation without forcing the user to do another POST operation. Is this possible, or do I need to first POST and save the :foo model in order to obtain the attributes of the :bar model?
Thanks.
You can use accepts_nested_attributes_for method one one of models, for more information please refer to API documentation.